Spiritual Advice column

Spiritual Advice Column: Can you go too Far (down the Rabbit Hole)?

Date: April 28, 2016

Author: maryshutan

There is a look to someone who has been too far, who has seen too much… at times this is an intent stare, other times an otherworldly gaze. Both seem as if they are looking through you, to the depths of you. Or perhaps they are not even noticing you, so lost in another dimension, timeline, or spiritual reality that most cannot notice.

It has been a while since I have done a Spiritual Advice column. I received an email from someone recently that I will not post (a lot of identifying info) but as this is a common theme I hear time and again, I thought that I would pose my thoughts on the subject.

The real sort of question here is one of fear. It is of going to some depth or broaching some understanding that would cause insanity, death, or some type of shattering, either in some real or imagined way.

For some spirituality is a sort of self-help, a way to feel momentarily better about oneself, perhaps finding tools and ways to lead a better life, a life filled with more peace and harmony… a filling of that void within that calls out for more that is momentarily satiated, or perhaps becomes smaller due to spiritual pursuits.

For others spirituality, the occult, shamanism, and so forth is about finding “truth”. It is about the realization that most of the world is asleep, numb, on auto-pilot, and a realization that there must be more beneath that.

This quest, to find out what lies beneath, has taken plenty of people beyond the sort of surface-level spirituality that caters to the self-help crowd. It is an entirely different quest, in fact. One quest is to feel better– to quiet the inner storm, that inner divide that whispers in the night to the person that they are not good enough.. that there must be something out there to make them feel less alone, more connected, and overall better about their lives.

The other quest is one of truth. It is to find personal truth. Collective truth. To know what really lurks beneath. There is healing here– this is no band-aid for the soul. It is brave, true, and warrior-like work. It is taking one step forward into all of that material that we have collected, that has made us who we are.. and bravely tearing off the packaging that makes us believe that we are one thing– one dominant personality, one incarnation– rather than a grouping of energies come together. It is a release of the stories and beliefs that we have considered to be “truth”… a release of them, and a realization that those stories have made us part of the collective that thinks, eats, and believes without questioning.

So the real question is if there is danger here. The answer is yes, of course there is.

Most of the world operates at such a superficial level that the idea of any truth– personal or collective– or of going beyond what is thought to be true, personally or collectively, emerges you in the proverbial rabbit hole. At the beginning of this rabbit hole is what we know to be true about ourselves. We can find a lot of companions here– others who wish to peek beneath the surface of things… explorers, warriors, and more.

This group at the surface of the rabbit hole, at the beginning of its depths, are warriors in their own right. They are searching for something more, for something larger than themselves. They are willing to do work, to look within, and to consider different forms of spirituality and how those can make a difference in their lives. The people here find tribes, companions, and others to help them in their quest.

But as you go deeper beyond the surface you must face truths about yourself and the world that are frightening. We are programmed to believe certain things about ourselves and the world. That first time that someone discovers that magic(k) is real, that spirits are not parts of the psyche, that your will can construct the universe, or that releasing a long-held belief and understanding about yourself can create radical transformation and change physically, mentally, and emotionally it is frightening.

It always is, quite simply. Because with each depth we traverse, the further we go, the more our outer world changes. In many cases this is in exceptional ways– we truly know who we are, we have more freedom from releasing long-standing patterns and beliefs. As we go deeper we find that we truly can shape our world, that our intent and focus and ability to exert our will can allow us to do so.

But each time that we release, that we learn something new, or there is a new spirit-led initiation, we need to integrate. Our entire world changes. Who we were may be gone in an instant, or may take several days (or weeks) to emerge.

And there is a danger about traversing your own depths. Most of us have really no idea about what is truly within ourselves– the amount of self-hatred, primal instincts (violence, lust, etc), and different aspects of self there are within. Some of these may be wonderful, aspects of our personality that we delight in embracing. We may find past lives, ancestors, and spirits that truly allow for us to feel power, safety, and delight in our travels.

But there are parts of all of us that are vile, evil, disgusting, and brutal. Working with these is quite different, and the discovery of them is something that is difficult to deal with. Because we, especially if we have been on a spiritual path, especially if we have been amassing light and energy and can feel the flows of the universe, find ourselves mid-rabbit hole suspended by these energies.

On more surface levels they are called “shadow” and the mainstream popularized way to deal with anything is to forcibly transmute it to light. But that doesn’t work here. What these elements want is not to be reviled, but to be understood. They are simply currents of energy that will not cede to forcibly being changed into something we deem more suitable, more light, more in line with our puritanical tastes.

And there is a danger in having experiences that few do. Realizing different worlds, timelines, and energies sounds wonderful to the aspirant until you discover that there is need for integration– there is a need to go to the grocery store while realizing that you are simultaneously living other lives. That you must feed the cats, brush your teeth, and go to work while an aspect of you is meandering in the Abyss.

And these realizations change your life. Once you realize that spirits are real (for example) there is no going back. There is no sitting around talking on a message board about if they are psychological or not. The reality of the spirit world has been experienced directly by you, and there is no going back from that. There are certain thresholds, certain doorways, that once traversed your understanding of the world, the cosmos, and of human society change irreparably.

So does this mean that these things mean that you have gone too far? Perhaps the answer is yes to this. I have seen this gaze too often, even though it is fairly rare. You can tell when someone has plunged into the depths of that rabbit hole. Many of them, when broached this question, understand that there is no going back to previous understandings. But there is no desire to go back to previous understandings, either. Once awake, once in the depths, the desire to go back to sleep is minimalized.

But what is more painful, more difficult is when you are mid-rabbit hole. When you have had some initations, experiences, and insights that separate you from others just enough that it can be painful. You are moving in a world that is asleep, and you are no longer that way. The desire for sleep, to go back to surface levels, to meaningless chatter, and to less of a warrior-like path is strong here.

And so is the resistance. Despite awakening, despite a solid spiritual path, despite initiations, those mid-rabbit hole still have not surrendered. Those deeper in know that they are too deep, and they go through the doorways because it is time. Those that are teaching, walking around, and functioning in this world are doing so at a high level, and they have left behind many of the stories, aspects of personality, and fears that the mind creates to try to keep those in that quest for truth in the same place.

Healing is a brave act. To go beyond means healing enough, letting go of enough of our beliefs, constructs, and reality to be able to truly find ourselves. The proposition of that is scary. Walking through every threshold, meeting every rebirth, allowing ourselves to move forward and beyond despite our wounds and constructs telling us that we should remain where we are, because at least that where we are is known, is a decision that all of us, no matter where we are in said proverbial rabbit hole face every day.

And some people are not strong enough, or go about things in the wrong way. I try my best to be authentic here, and it is true. Some people find magical, spiritual, and other workings that cause for them to shift suddenly and violently, way past where there current personality, who and what they currently are can handle. They cannot integrate walking through a large threshold, or going from the surface to the depths of the Abyss in one jump.

Any spiritual or magical path should first focus on the Self. Because unless you are stable and reasonably integrated you do not go through those thresholds well. I do not teach, for example, about advanced spiritual work to someone who needs to process their past lives, or focus on their self healing because that is important. That must come first.

Once you work your way through your own stuff, enough that you are balanced and able to hold power and exert your will, moving through thresholds is frightening, but typically manageable. But traversing the depths of yourself is brave, and most prefer the surface for good reason.

So the simple question I am asked in various forms here is Can you go too far? or What happens if stuff starts to happen that is frightening? or What happens when you have spiritual realizations and direct experiences that not many do?

The answer to most of this, for most people, has to do with personal healing and personal power. If we are able to heal ourselves, and the extensions of ourselves (past life, ancestry, sub-personalities, and so forth) are reasonably integrated, we are able to access more of our inherent power. And this is what most people deeply fear about themselves. They really do not fear the pain, or the suffering… they fear the release… what will happen when they actually experience more freedom, when they are who they really are in this world, and are able to stand in their own power and exert their own will into this world?

The other part of this is that yes, things get weird. They just do. Thinking and being in a world that is asleep is simply an odd thing to do. Having spiritual experiences, initations, and understandings that are far down that rabbit hole do separate you in a superficial way. But they also give you the ability to connect, more deeply and with more truth. Our human connections are tenuous, we have love and need connection to one another. But connecting directly to source allows that deep sort of connection that is hard to put into words. The search for spirituality is the search to not feel alone, and going further down the rabbit hole allows for you to feel that connection and fill that “hole” in a way that many are really engaging in this quest to find.

So yes, you can go too far… You can go too far to properly be able to integrate, too far for your current personality and belief system and mind to be able to handle. But if you do your own work and heal and integrate with depth, you will continue to go deeper with (relative) grace.

Spiritual Advice Column: Our Relationship with Spirits

Date: January 15, 2016

Author: maryshutan

Categories: shamanism, Spiritual Advice column

Dear Mary-

I love your website it is very informative and not BS like other websites that I have been on. My question would be, and I do not know if you have addressed this before so forgive me, but what was/is the relationship of Shamans and Spirits? The reason I ask is because what I get from most practitioner’s relationships with spirit is romance, jobs, money, court cases, etc. Why do Shamans work with Spirits and vice versa? This applies to all types of spirits.

Thanks Mary and keep up the good work.

Nicky

Hi Nicky-

Thank you for submitting this question. It is an important one, and one that is often overlooked for various reasons.

There are a few sub-questions here that I will bring up– such as why do spirits work with us? and what is working with actual spirits like? along with your excellent question of what is the relationship of Spiritual Workers (I use that word instead of Shaman for a lot of reasons people are pretty tired of me talking about by now) to Spirits?

So first things first. Most people do not work with spirits, or more accurately, they likely do not know what or who they are working with… or they have not achieved any depth in their spiritual relationships.

What does this mean? It means that a lot of people self-create spirits and energies to work with. They are a part of themselves. I harp on this a bit because if you are working with something that you self-created it can only have so much power. Meaning it can only have up to and including how much power you personally have. If you are working with an actual spirit, you are working with not only your own power but theirs as well. This is a really important distinction.

So if we self-create spirits they can be our indentured servants, or slaves. They are typically one-dimensional, without much personality, show up whenever you want them to, and will do whatever you want. They also tend to agree with whatever you say, or will only say things to you that come from either your conscious awareness or from one of the more surface layers of your subconscious.

I will say that working with parts of yourself, specifically integrating them, is really important work. But it is different than working with actual spirits.

Also, a lot of people have no idea what or who they are working with. They may be working with a spirit but the spirit is not showing their true form either because you are not ready for them to (a very common reason), you have been taught that spirits are intended to be these indentured servants and are supposed to act in particular ways (hello upper and lower world cosmology) and so your own mind and belief systems (basically your issues) are stopping them from completely coming through. Or coming through in their true form.

Another reason is that a spirit (for example a former human) may say that they are your guide, or an Archangel, or whatever, so they can attach to you. It happens more than people might think. People aren’t really taught discernment and practicality when it comes to the spirit world, so they will accept anything that comes their way at face value. If someone were to come up to you in a bar and tell you that they were a multi-millionaire film producer who wants you to be in a starring role in their next movie, you would likely have the common sense to realize they were full of it. But if a similar thing happens in the spiritual realms, people don’t question it. Odd, isn’t it?

The other question here is one of depth. Most people do not have the skills, or more likely, the patience to develop significant spiritual relationships. It takes time. I have worked with spirits for years who have put me through trials, or wouldn’t even tell me their name for a period of time. They were checking to see if I was worthy of working with them. This happens, especially if you are working with more powerful energies/spirits/beings.

So back to your question…

Why do Spiritual Workers work with Spirits? In simplicity, if you are an actual spiritual worker (and don’t just play one on tv or in weekend workshops) it is dangerous to work by yourself. You need to have working relationships with Spirits, basically.

Spiritual workers do work with spirits because spirits can more easily travel and understand the spiritual realms than humans in their meat suits can. They can be intermediaries, bringing through messages from other spirits and energies that may not be able to talk directly to you for whatever reason. Also, a spirit or energy that I am working with that is attached to someone may not want to talk to me, but they often are willing to talk to one of my spirits that I work with.

We also need to talk about power here. A Spiritual Worker is as powerful as their network of spirits. If you have developed deep, significant working relationships to your spirits, they will not only do work for you, but they will bring their power and protection to the session.

More simply put, if you are not connected to spirits and you are doing work only through yourself (with self-created spirits or you just don’t have the skill or depth yet to work with actual spirits or have working relationships with them) and try to do moderate to difficult spiritual work you will get sick, you will be attacked, and you will walk around tired most of the time. This is because a single human isn’t that filled with power, no matter who they are. They are only so protected. So what happens is that if you do not have a “network” of spirits working with you, you burn out, and are more open to be harmed.

The above is incredibly common, by the way. I have heard about so many “shamans” getting sick, being tired, or being attacked all the time, and it just doesn’t have to happen. Not saying some work will not be tiring some days (like all work is) but if you develop proper spiritual relationships (as well as know what you are doing. Sigh…) it just doesn’t really happen.

So in my work my spirits do most of my work. I am there to direct them (sometimes, most of the time they can do better work and in different ways than I can), but mainly my job these days is to talk to the client and take them through the mental-emotional aspect of things so that they can consciously accept the work that I, and my spirits, are doing.

Spirits are also my teachers, guides, and elders. I have deep respect for them. Most spirits that I have developed working relationships with have more power than I could possibly ever have… but also they have much more wisdom than I do. They are my teachers, my guides, and my elders. This is only because I trust them and know who they are, though. I don’t go to spiritual workshops any more because the spirits I work with have a lot more wisdom and guidance than any human source could. This happens to most actual Spiritual Workers over time– they are taught directly by spirits and it is much deeper, much more wisdom and power than any book or workshop or whatever. But again, this is only if they are not self-created and quoting law of attraction type stuff (which most self-created spirits tend to do, it seems).

So now let us explore the other half of this… We have talked about how spirits can bring us power, they can protect us, they can work for us. They are important teachers, elders, and guides. This is only if we are in a working relationship with them, however. Just like you wouldn’t ask a random person at a bar to loan you a thousand dollars (well, most of us wouldn’t) you wouldn’t ask a random spirit to do work for you.

If we do not have a working relationship to spirits, to power external from ourselves, we burn out. We are intended to be in a network, to have power other than our own support us, guide us, and so forth. We either burn out or we are doing just life coach style psychological shamanism with no real power. And without power, we can only do so much work. Again, it just doesn’t happen. But I have seen this happen so much with people– they are doing spiritual work and are constantly talking about being attacked, sick all the time, or their work simply doesn’t do much (or all three). While there is a psychological component to the whole “shaman sickness” thing in some of these cases, it is mostly because the “shaman” hasn’t developed either their own power or external/network of power.

Those people that you refer to that are just asking for money or want things from spirits without giving anything back are not in a real relationship with spirits, by the way. It just isn’t how it works. Especially if you haven’t developed a relationship. Nothing drives me up the wall than random people calling on some archangel or saint or some random goetic something or other without developing a relationship with them. Because best case scenario it won’t do much. Worst case scenario they can really piss something off.

It is not like you can’t petition a spirit for money, or help in a relationship, but again, it takes time and effort to build a strong relationship with a spirit where they are willing to do something like this for you. And then, you typically don’t need the type of help that most people self-creating spirits and asking random spirits for things are looking for. If you do find a spirit willing to bring you money, or whatever, without knowing them, I suggest deeply questioning why they are doing so. If some random dude at the bar wouldn’t give you money, why would a “spirit guide”.

There is trust that is necessary, there is time and patience that is required to build relationships (especially a working relationship). Like all relationships, working with spirits requires respect, time, patience, and depth.

So why do Spirits work with us?

In a real working relationship, spirits work with us for a variety of reasons. It might be their job, quite frankly. Certain spirits enjoy working with humanity, and to do so lets them help aid humanity.

Some spirits may enjoy bestowing their wisdom on people, and acting like elders.

As mentioned before, some spirits are specifically meant to be ambassadors to the spirit world, to be a link between the physically dense world and other realms. It is their job, basically

But in a lot of spirit relationships, spiritual workers learn how to give proper offerings. This is a whole blog in and of itself, but many spirits do not work for nothing. They want specific offerings from the spiritual worker as payment. This is the most common reason spirits (as in actual spirits) work with humans.

Other spirits who are more powerful may want to claim a spiritual worker. Although this sounds odd, basically what happens in a spiritual relationship (well, some of them) is that you have a hierarchy of spirits. Some spirits wish to be the most important spirit in your life, and will only form a bond or work with you if you agree to terms like this (and/or other terms that work for the spirit).

As mentioned, some spirits test Spiritual Workers over the course of months, or years (or decades… Sigh) to develop a deepening relationship with the Spiritual Worker. Each test that you pass that shows your worth allows for you to work with the Spirit on a deeper level, and to access and be able to be in a “network” with more of their power.

It is worth mentioning that some spirits just like to screw with humans, to cause them harm, or to essentially make fun of “shamans” who don’t know what they are doing by attaching to them and draining their energy, or finding some sort of inlet inward to form a contract or agreement with the “shaman” without them being conscious of it to not only drain energy but also disrupt their life, attach to their clients, and so forth. This happens a fair amount, especially because there is a lack of discernment and practicality in learning how to be a “shaman” and it is treated like something that anyone can do for fun on the weekends these days.

And finally, some spirits work to elevate themselves. There is a hierarchy to the spiritual realms, and some spirits work with accomplished spiritual workers because the work itself (doing spiritual work) as well as aligning to a spiritual worker allows for them to become more elevated, or basically, go up a few spots (or a lot of spots) in the hierarchy of the spirit world.

I hope that answers your questions, Nicky, and again, great question!

Mary

If you would like to submit a question for my spiritual advice column, you can contact me here. Please note, I do not answer all questions, and am not an allopathic physician (meaning go to your doctor if you are concerned about something, and take my opinions/thoughts with the proverbial grain of salt).

Spiritual Advice Column: Protection

Date: January 2, 2016

Author: maryshutan

Categories: shamanism, Spiritual Advice column

Hi Mary-

So a former teacher of mine (who I won’t name) used to tell me that nobody needed protection really during spiritual work. Or that all we needed was a power animal. She even said at one point that people who feel like they need protection, or people who run across “dark things” have something psychologically wrong with them. Like if you meet a dark spirit it is all your fault, especially if you run across them a lot. She also used to basically make fun of people who felt like they needed protection too, like she was somehow better than them because she didn’t need protection and those people who did feel like they needed so much protection were wrong and didn’t know what they were talking about.

I have grown a lot since her (she was my first teacher) but I still don’t know how I should feel about this. Can you give me your thoughts on the subject?

– Sylvie

Hi Sylvie-

Thank you for writing in! So my thoughts on the subject of protection are somewhat two sided.

I think that some people over-protect themselves; or more clearly, they have learned protections like shielding that are from their own thought forms that are either not effective or are in fact detrimental to them (more on this later).
I think that a lot of people are really naive about protection. They have no idea about what is around them because they aren’t particularly sensitive, and they haven’t actually learned how to protect themselves in any real way. So they try the “dartboard” approach– where they read about surface level things like sage or salt or creating a shield out of their thoughts (basically trying anything and everything to see what sticks)– and mostly don’t know the first thing about real protection, as in protection methods that would actually help them if they actually needed protection.

So as far as your teacher, thank you for not naming her, and I do my best to not go after individuals, because most people are caring, they just may be ignorant or stuck in their ways. A lot of teachers, especially “core” shamanic ones, tend to learn things a specific way, or have a specific ideology or cosmology, and they get stuck. They never grow past it. And a lot of “shamanism” these days is just self-help psychotherapeutic techniques. So in the therapeutic model, of course if someone has fear it goes back to early childhood, of course if someone wants to protect themselves it is psychological wounding of some sort. If someone says something like this it is just telling you that they are not interfacing with the spiritual world much, quite frankly. They are squarely in the self-help arena of psychotherapeutic shamanism.

I realize the above is a bit rough, but it is true. Plus the psychological self-help core shamanic type stuff still annoys me a bit. I should probably get over that, because I have full knowledge that most people want the psychological self-help type shamanism because it makes them feel better about themselves, and can be done on weekends, etc. with no repercussions to their daily lives, and it is rough to go beyond a certain point on the spiritual path, and most people simply realize this. But back to your question…

Protection is a vital part of any spiritual worker’s eduction. It is important to know how to protect yourself, and protect yourself well. It is important to know how to protect your family, your house, your business, your pets, and so forth.

This sort of education is missing from most modern day spiritual worker’s tool kit. Tools such as really knowing how to cleanse (step one), and then really learning how to protect, ward, reverse, and so forth should be in any moderate to advanced spiritual worker’s toolkit.

This is because if you are on the surface level of things, where you are play-acting basically, you really don’t need protection. You may need some clearing, but not really protection. You aren’t interfacing with much. You are basically interfacing with disassociated aspects of yourself and of your own power.

It is when you go beyond the point of recognizing that there is more than you out there (no, you are not the center of the Universe and everything was not creating from you or your wounds, believe it or not) that you really need protection practices. It is when you start to accumulate power and relationships with things outside of yourself that you need protection.

So for your teacher, and many others like her out there (of which there are hoards) she likely does not believe that anyone needs protection because she has never met anything outside of herself, and is still of the belief that her thoughts and emotions create the Universe. I always think that this view is incredibly narcissistic, but that is just me.

Some people in the surface category really do have emotional wounds, by the way. They protect themselves with anything and everything they can find because they are deeply afraid of the spiritual realms. They end up harming themselves by shielding. Most people shield by thoughts– basically they create a visual image of a shield (or a bubble, or whatever) and place it in or around them. This uses energy. The energy of the person creating it. So the person becomes really depleted of energy, because they are not only using their energy for their daily functions but often to create elaborate shielding mechanisms.

Also, when you create a shield it doesn’t allow energy in, either. That “bad energy” you are cutting yourself off of? It is also cutting you off from “good” energy as well. Ideally we will have flow through our bodies and through our energy fields so that any type of energy… in fact the whole universe… flows through us. This can be a hard state to get to, however. Most people have so much baggage and trauma and beliefs in the way (that go way deeper than early childhood by the way) that getting clear flow through their bodies is hard, plus they do not know the tools to do so.

And by the way….

I meet “bad” or negative spirits all the time. It doesn’t mean anything other than the fact that I meet a lot of spirits, and think that being willing to be of service to your community as a spiritual worker means that you are willing to listen to and work with a wide variety of spirits. The spiritual realms are a lot like the physical realms in a lot of ways. Even if you are completely “healed” or new-aged up with the appropriate colored lights and memes, you are going to meet a few jerks. No matter how enlightened you are, someone is going to cut you off in traffic.

In fact, the categorization of spirits into neat piles– this one is “bad” and this one is “good”– always indicates to me that someone hasn’t progressed very far on their spiritual path, and has not really interacting with anyone outside of themselves. Think of your friends, your family, your co-workers. Chances are they are a mix of “good” and “bad”, a mix of ethics, ideas, personalities. This same thing happens in the spirit world.

There are so many different types of spirits and beings out there, and they just do not singularly fit into neat categories or “upper world” vs. “lower world” vs. “middle world” categorization. I realize our brains like this sort of stuff, but it simply is untrue.

So if you are meeting a lot of bad, difficult, or negative spirits there are a wide variety of reasons:

You are psychologically having issues and parts of your psyche are attempting to make themselves known through being difficult or harmful
You simply have an awareness level that includes many different types of spirits
You have progressed past a certain point spiritually where you realize that “good” and “bad” spirits are not so neatly divided when they are not self-created and are actually interacting with actual spirits
You are called to psychopomp work, or “dark” work where you are healing or ministering to spirits that are of the not-so “love and light” variety
You are living somewhere that for whatever reason has a bunch of difficult spirits around

By the way, I should mention that the “lighter” and “higher vibration” you get on a spiritual path, the more you notice darkness. The more you notice your own darkness, that of the world, that of the spiritual world. Spiritual Workers who are really light are also really dark. This is because everything has the opportunity to be worked with spiritually, and an actual spiritual worker will interface with a lot of it… and a compassionate spiritual worker will have just as much compassion towards a being that is amoral, or difficult, as one that is angelic (and ironically also may be immoral, but that is a matter for a different day).

So why learn protection?

Because if you are doing spiritual work, or progress on your spiritual path past a certain point, you are like a nightlight.

This means that you can see the spirit world(s) and the spirit world(s) can see you (in simple terms). This means that if you do not protect yourself and set boundaries you will never get any sleep. This means that if you do not protect yourself good, bad, difficult, happy, curious spirits (and everything in between) will interfere with your work, just drop in, attach to you in order to heal (or for other purposes), or just basically be excited to interact with someone who has a lit nightlight.

If you do not protect yourself after you progress past a certain point you will have active, non-restorative dreams (because you will be doing things all not in the dream realms or will be interfered with in your sleep), and if you are really sensitive you will constantly have health issues, fatigue, and serious overload issues.

Being really sensitive and aware in this world is like watching twenty, or fifty, or three thousand televisions at once. It can be difficult, it can be really difficult. And although a much different topic, parts of you can be in many different timelines or worlds or universes at once, which can get a bit confusing, and quite frankly, dizzying.

So if you do not know how to protect yourself, and protect yourself effectively (beyond destructive shielding and waving around some sage) you will be in a lot of trouble. But this is true only if your nightlight is turned “on” and is fairly bright.

Otherwise you really can stay with your psychological constructs, as you likely won’t be noticed by much, and don’t really need much, if any, protection.

I very much think that anyone who is beyond the “beginner” stage (and this stage doesn’t mean a short period of time, I meet people who have been on a “shamanic” path for forty years who are still in this stage, as well as people who have been on a spiritual path for a very short time– well, consciously– who are way beyond this stage) should learn protection. Proper protection. Protection that allows for them to have guides, ancestors, and spirits that form a network for them. Protection with herbs, minerals, and other objects so you don’t have to use your own energy. Protection from using Universal energy (and how to properly access it) instead of your own. Protection that is for mild, moderate, and severe situations. You may never need the “severe” protections, but knowledge truly is power, and even knowing information on how to properly protect yourself in all situations can be of assistance to you. This is because when you have certain aspects of embodied knowledge, that gets transmitted outward. When you are interacting with spirits, many will know if you are a beginner, or if you know enough to properly clear, banish, or deflect them.

So yes, Sylvie, a lot of people over-protect or utilize ineffective protection when they don’t need to. A lot of people who are in the beginner stage don’t need to protect… evidently since they are still in a stage of creating everything in the Universe they can just get over their Daddy issues and they will be okay. But for the rest of us, we should learn protection. Not because we will need it all the time (or the severe forms of it all the time) but because we might need it, and it is a foundational tool for anyone on a serious spiritual path to learn.

Spiritual Advice Column: Psychic Abilities, Fakeness, and Anger

Date: September 29, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: psychic abilities, Spiritual Advice column

Hi Mary-

Thank you for your book first of all! I also enjoy all of the information I have read so far on your blog. I hope you can help me with this. I have always been psychic I guess. I remember being little and talking to imaginary friends and seeing spirits when I was a kid. I think I stopped my abilities because my parents got angry with me because I had them. They would get angry and tell me that I was just making things up so somehow I stopped things?

Anyway, I started getting them back when I was a teenager. So here is my question. I know in a blog you read about how many fakes there are out there. I get really, really angry about this. I get really angry when someone tells me they are psychic and I know they are not, and I get upset at all those reality shows of psychics. I have had a difficult life because I felt like I had to keep my abilities secret. I feel like living in a world where I am able to see so much is hard, and everybody talks about psychic abilities like they are great. I am doing better with this now, but when I look at other people claiming to be psychic and I can tell that they are not I just can’t help really disliking them.

How do I get over this? That is my simple question. I don’t want to feel the anger I feel but some of these people and the whole world seems so fake about this. I get tired of seeing books and people talk about how great it is to be a psychic. They are all so fake!

– Angry Psychic

Hi Angry Psychic:

So this is a common problem for people, and a common problem with society at large, so thank you for bringing it up.

First, let us talk about society… Yes, you are right. Most of the people claiming to be psychic are not. Most of the people who are professional psychics are not psychic. They just have good P.R., they are gregarious, they can cold read people (look for psychological cues), they can google, etc.

But here is the thing. Most people when they are looking for a psychic don’t actually want a psychic. They want a Medium who tells them that their lost loved one is safe and loves them, they want someone to tell them that everything is going to be okay, they want someone to tell them that they will meet the love of their life, that their boyfriend (or girlfriend or husband/wife/partner) is not cheating on them, that they will become wealthy, and that they will get that new job and become a millionaire.

So there has become a whole market of illusory psychics who tell people this sort of stuff… and since it is what people want to hear it works out. It is “fake”, but both sides get what they need, basically. There is a lot of illusion in this world, however.. not just in the realm of psychics… and we all sometimes need to hear that everything is okay.

I used to have a lot of difficulty with the fact that all of these “psychics” were basically feeding off of the despair of others (especially in the cases of mediumship, but also in general), and how anyone with any amount of psychic ability can tell how they have no (or very little) actual sensitivity or psychic abilities, but at some point I realized that most people generally find what they are looking for.

If people want illusion, especially comforting illusion, they will find the illusory psychics. If they want someone to actually tell them how things look, they will find a spiritual reader or worker that actually has psychic abilities. It is just how things go. We find the truth we are prepared for. And if we want to be comfortable, for someone to tell us that our dead whomever forgives us, we will find someone who will tell us just that.

It is funny– there used to be a woman in many of my bodywork classes who would come in each workshop and loudly proclaim with a huge smile on her face that she was clairvoyant. Looking at her you realized that she was probably the furtherest thing from clairvoyant in the room (there were probably five-ten students and teachers all of whom were more sensitive/psychic than she was). At the time this made me extremely dislike her. It probably didn’t help that she quoted the same b.s. that all of those people do. People who are actually sensitive tend to have their own direct experiences and revelations of a spiritual nature and generally don’t need to quote Eckhart Tolle or whomever I have found– they can just speak from their truth and not the recycled sayings of others from the latest Oprah show.

There are a lot of people like this out there. It is the grass is always greener syndrome. People who are actually sensitive tend to have a lot of difficulty with their abilities, especially if they are pretty strong, and especially when they manifest in childhood and teenager years like they do with a lot of people (a time known for its already treacherous terrain of hormones and initiations all of a physical and mental variety… and where we are never celebrated for being different… because being different- thinking or seeing or sensing differently- at those ages means that you need special attention… or these days medication).

People who wouldn’t know something spiritual if it hit them over the head with a spirit hammer are always the ones claiming to be psychic or sensitive. This is why 99 percent of the books out there are for opening your third eye, or the same recycled information about chakras again and again. Because people really don’t have their own spiritual experiences– they don’t have the sensitivity level to. So they just recycle the same sayings and knowledge, even if it is false knowledge, again and again like a bad game of telephone.

The other thing is that through their direct experience some of these “psychics” are actually psychic. I often give the analogy of five people walking into a room. Two people notice five things (stimuli, objects, etc), one person notices ten things, one person notices twenty five, and the last notices 2,500. It is likely that the person who notices ten things is the type of person to loudly proclaim their psychic abilities. This is because they notice a bit more than other people, but it hasn’t had a large impact on their life to create trauma.

Because that is what this is all about– trauma. It is hard to be that person that notices 2,500 things when most people notice five. It really is. But the anger is coming from not the fakes, not the illusions, but from your own experiences in this world.

This world is an illusion. People create illusions, and most people only understand their own direct experience. So the “aspirational psychic”– the one who is psychic because they are noticing 15 things doesn’t know about your experience of noticing twenty five or 2,500. They just don’t. They know about their own direct experience of wanting to be psychic, thinking they are because of a book or school or because they have “decalcified their pineal gland” or whatever… they think they are because they are perhaps opening a bit more, or are a bit more psychic than they used to be. But all of this doesn’t really have anything to do with you.

People believe what they need to be true about themselves. If they need to be psychic, if they want to be psychic, if they model their lives after Long Island Medium (or whatever is popular these days in this sort of thing), that is their business.

For you I would suggest working through the trauma that has been created due to your abilities. The more you can release the hurt, the anger, the fear… the more that you can learn how to properly work with your psychic abilities so they are not painful or destructive to you emotionally, physically, energetically, spiritually… the more you can start to let go of this pattern.

There will always be people out there in the spiritual “field” who are claiming to be much more than they are. They have had one or two spiritual experiences so they know the depths of the Universe, have changed their name, and are holding satsangs… they create their own memes… they claim to be psychic.

It is not our job to control other people. They will do and be what they will do and be. And it is out of control to police people who are presenting themselves as something they are not. Truth is, most of us are. Most of us wear a mask to cover up our insecurities, our fear, our unprocessed emotions and needs for control. Most people do this throughout their lives, and do not have the presence of mind or need (or want) to change.. to learn who they truly are and become fully who they are meant to be.

As someone who can see behind the masks like you do, you have this unique ability. So do yourself a favor and let go of the trauma and whatever else is holding you back. You will realize that people are constructing illusions like they always do and just go to a state of noticing when you do notice the illusions (rather than reaction). The fact that you are reacting to this rather than the one million (yes, I made that up) other illusions out there means that there is trauma there for you to work on personally.

For now, when you come across one of these people individually, you can tell yourself that you are releasing any need of control of them. Just repeat it internally until you feel things shift.

When you come across it collectively, allow yourself to realize that so much of the “comfortable illusion” wouldn’t be out there if people didn’t want it. There are other books and resources for you (like me, hopefully!) and if you can let go, if you can realize that most people want to be comfortable, even (and especially) when it comes to spiritual matters… and you are simply looking for something different… you will find what you are looking for… and you can heal.

I hope this helps, and you are (as well as anyone else who is reading this) welcome to contact me for a session. I work with a lot of people who need help releasing this type of anger, fear, and the trauma that comes from having psychic abilities. You can read more about individual sessions for psychics and sensitives here… and read about my ethical pledge here (I do not work with everyone… I only work with people I feel like I can be of service to and are ready for the type of work that I do).

The Spiritual Advice Column: I occasionally answer questions from people on psychic abilities, spiritual awakenings, shamanism/spiritual work, and other spiritual subjects. You are welcome to contact me with your question (please put Spiritual Advice column in the email/note), and I will write about it if I think that other people could benefit from it, and that it is something that I have knowledge about. My advice is obviously not from an allopathic standpoint, and all questions may be edited for clarity and focus.

Spiritual Advice: Psychic Ability to Predict Death

Date: July 1, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: Near Death Experience, psychic abilities, Psychopomp, shamanic calling, Spiritual Advice column

Mary-

I found your site because I wanted to know more about how I can sense death in people. Sometimes I look at people in the market and I see some of them that are going to die. Sometimes I will even sense how it will happen like a guy I saw I knew he was going to get in a car crash.

Another time I saw a woman who was pregnant and I knew that she was going to miscarry the child. It is awful to realize these things. Most of the time they are about people that I don’t know and just see around town, but sometimes I realize that a friend is going to get sick, or one time I realized my cousin was going to die. I would think it was just my imagination, but my cousin did actually die and the feelings I get when I realize these things are really intense. For example I will get a headache or feel dread or even a few times would see how the person would die. But most of the time I just feel kind of sick and it is like a big realization that I just can’t shake.

Can you tell me what this all means? What do I do about this? I can’t imagine I go up to people and tell them that they are going to die. That would just be weird. How do I not get upset about this too? I don’t think I want to block things, but they do make me not feel well. If you could reply it would be really, really helpful.

– Seer of Death

Hi Seer-

So what this ability is called is precognition. It is typically under the umbrella of claircognition. Claircognition means “clear knowing”. It is our gut instinct, that sort of intuition that mothers get when their children are in trouble. It is our sense of knowing something without knowing why. Claircognition is actually the most common psychic ability, but is often dismissed because we live in a culture that dismisses that quiet voice inside, that sense of knowing that emerges. Most of us are quite dismissive of any sort of information that pops up without us having a context for it, a narrative, a story, or some sort of linear logic from our brains/ego telling us that the information is valid and okay.

This sense of knowing, this claircognition, can be a small sense of knowing that we should turn right instead of left down a street, only to find out that there was a traffic accident that would have made us late to our appointment if we had turned left. It can also be a huge sense of knowing, accompanied by dread and chills and becoming physically ill with realizing that there are going to be layoffs at our company, that something bad is going to happen to us (and we don’t know what, but we just have this realization), or that a pet, family member, or complete stranger is going to die.

Just so this doesn’t seem all gloomy (before I go on to the death part), claircognition is an incredibly useful ability to have. We can know if our children are okay, how that test is going to go, what job we should take, if that boy/girl/man/woman is right for us, and get a general sense of environment. For example, if we listen to our claircognition we may pick up that the bar we are at, the subway car we are in, or the street we are walking down is not safe. We may not know why, but this sense of knowing causes us to walk down another street, to leave the bar, or to move on the subway. Most of us do this behavior unconsciously– our claircognitive skills are not conscious so we want to leave the bar, or the train, or walk quicker down the street (or change streets) without knowing why.

But some of us become conscious of our claircognition and utilize it to our advantage. We begin to listen to our gut instinct, to acknowledge it, and to even express gratitude for it giving us information. Again, most of us do not listen to what our instincts are telling us… we have become disconnected from them because we are either looking for something crassly linear and double-blind study logical (typically meaning told to us by others or given to us by others) or we are looking for huge explosions of psychic abilities, such as the media portrays clairvoyance (clear seeing). By acknowledging this ability and listening to it we can become better people more in line with who we truly are.

It is important to understand that society at large is not in a sensing or feeling state, so others (even those interested in spiritual matters) are likely to disregard your experiences that come from this feeling or sensing state. This comes from an ego state of always wanting that hugely splashy thing or “valid” linear scientific double-blind study type proof. If we listen to others who are not capable or comfortable with being in a state of sensing or feeling, we often disregard our own experiences and understandings. It is important not to do so in an attempt to seek outer acceptance of abilities such as this.

To acknowledge and grow your claircognition is simple: you acknowledge what is coming up (I should move subway cars), sit with it for a moment to feel if it is valid or not (by asking your gut, not your head)… when you hear a “yes” you act on that action by moving subway cars (for example). Then say “thank you” to that information, to your gut instinct for telling you this information. If it is a huge move, such as getting a divorce or moving to another country, you can still acknowledge what is coming up but sit with it for a while longer before making a move or drastic life change. Even acknowledging that this information is coming up and saying a simple “thank you” to it without changing anything in your physical reality will allow for you to gradually understand how powerful this ability actually is.

Now, on to precognition. Precognition, as I mentioned, is somewhat of a child of claircognition, typically. This means that you will realize that something will happen in the future without knowing why. This can be all sorts of information, from realizing you will get that job you just interviewed for to realizing you are going to move in the next six months to realizing that two weeks from now you are going to be sick. Many sensitives, for example, with this ability, schedule their work around the fact that they realize when they will be at full power, or have the ability to work a lot, and when they need a break or even bed rest.

A type of precognition is the ability to see or sense death. This can be sort of a vague sense of knowing to full clairvoyant (seeing) abilities of seeing a stranger in the grocery store die in a fiery crash in the near future. This can be difficult information to process, and the sensitive who sees it may experience headaches, nausea, stomach issues, or emotional imbalances from seeing so much death around them. It also can understandably be a bit of a perpetual existential crisis to have this ability, to want to get rid of it, to not know what to do about it, or to have this ability call up our own fears around death. It is also a huge difficulty for some people who are especially sensitive with this ability to have to process the energy and the death of the person through their physical body.

I should note that it is most common to see death at or around two weeks before the physical death. Our spiritual bodies are preparing (or trying to prepare) for what is going to occur in the near future, and in most cases (not all, some sudden deaths are not like this) sensitives are sensing the fact that the energy bodies are lifting off of the body towards the top of the head (typically) near death, or that there is a grey or dark cast/hue around the person who is going to die suddenly.

So the question is always what to do about this ability. It is an understandable question, and I have personally grappled with seeing a lot of things that I cannot or should not do anything about. In our modern culture (media portrayals such as Ghost Whisperer and Long Island Medium) we see “mediums” (yes, I put that in quotes for a reason) walking up to random strangers and telling them that their dead grandmother is with them. I have personally had people walk up to me and try to read me. It deeply bothers me when this happens. First off, because it is always the person that has the least amount of sensitivities (as in, not very psychic at all or perhaps went to a psychic school and got a certificate which means they are, of course, now psychic) who tell me things that are often not correct, are from conversation they overheard, or are so basic that they are more cold reading (a sort of psychological ability to read body language, faces, or just utilizing really basic generalized info that could apply to anyone) in order to appear special.

It is ethically wrong to tell someone that they are going to die, or to tell them any sort of psychic information that you are picking up about them. The only way that it is okay is if they are paying you, or coming to you for guidance, and you deeply question if they really want to know or can hear (as in process) the information you are picking up about them.

The other thing to know about the ability to see death is that it is not 100 percent. Meaning you could be wrong, meaning that you could be reading someone else in the store instead (their death) and cross a few wires and have it be about another person by mistake, you could be having an off day or so overwhelmed by stuff going on in your own life or that there is so much death in the air (it happens) that you can sense it with everyone. That person you are picking up information about could also turn left instead of right by some miracle and not get in that car crash you sense them in. It happens.

So my point is here that you do not do anything about the information. You do not tell them. Maybe you choose not to get in a car with them (for example) but telling them is ethically wrong for a variety of reasons.

So the question here is what do you do about this ability… or “Why do I have it?” This is something of a difficult question, and depends on the individual. You may have it simply because you do… you are sensitive and you pick up on more information than people around you. Death is actually fairly easy to pick up on as long as you don’t have blinders on (many people refuse to process any information about death or “darkness” because it is not “light” and they have a deep fear about their own inevitable death). Death is part of our world, and picking up when someone has two weeks left (or so, not an exact science) or the sort of cast or shadow that happens when someone is likely to die suddenly is not super far left-field… meaning that it is fairly easy to see.

Some of us have had experiences with death that make us more prone to see it in the people around us. We are comfortable with death, or we have had some sort of trauma involving death that allows for us (as people who are already likely sensitive) to be more in tune with that energy. Some of us have had near death experiences that have allowed for us to see death in those around us.

Some of us are intended to be spiritual workers and actually do something with this information. Some spiritual workers can see the “death mask” on everyone. Our “death mask” is what we will look like in death, and often contains information about how long we have left, what we will die of/from, and so forth. Other spiritual workers can see the inner light of a person (like a candle) and see how brightly it shines. If it shines more brightly, that means the person has more life left in them. The spiritual workers who can see this are often (not always) good at psychopomp– which is helping people spiritually cross over out of their physical body (move out of their physical body after death) as well as from their spirit form into the proverbial light.

Some of us are intended to be nurses, hospice workers, or others who work with death and the dying process.

Some of us are intended to utilize our relationship with death to create fantastic pieces of art and beauty in this world.

But most of us are not intended to do anything with this information simply because we see it. You are just more sensitive, for whatever reason, and your sensitivities are allowing you to notice death.

What is needed though is to let go of the intense emotions, fear, and physical issues (as well as existential crises) that come with this ability. You do this by reconciling your personal fears around death, any trauma you may have experienced with death, and most importantly you go into a state of noticing rather than reaction to receiving any sort of psychic input. By going to a state of noticing, rather than taking the energy on (which makes you physically and emotionally ill) or processing it (this does not! need to happen), you can become much healthier, more sane, and react neutrally to seeing these sorts of things.

Spiritual Advice: Processing of Energy, Soul Retrieval, and Proper Aftercare

Date: May 30, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: shamanism, Soul Retrieval, Spiritual Advice column, Uncategorized

Mary-

I recently worked on someone who had a soul retrieval done, and she said she had had many lifetimes of horrific deaths and suicides brought back in, which she then had to integrate. This led to months of anger and depression, as her body tried to process it. My question is, do we need to process all of our spiritual experiences through our bodies? It was affecting her spleen and liver systems. She was “digesting” it. It seems like many people have superficial spiritual experiences. They are too happy, like they haven’t been dragged through the muck! Do we usually digest the information or whatever in order to really integrate and experience it? Are there other routes or pathways? Can we just let some things go, or keep them on a less physical level and still have them be real? I know this question is getting weird…

Katie

Hi Katie-

So the short answer is yes, we need to process things through our physical bodies, our physical container for us to consider it to be real and for it to have an effect on our physical, external lives. We hold all of our experiences in our body– our current lifetime, past lives, ancestry, karma… and even larger patterns like societal patterns, family patterns, and even the whole Universe (I will not go there this blog) that are not technically “of us”.

For the “lower” patterns (stuff that actually has to do with us like our current lifetime, past lives, and our ancestry) anything that has a charge stays in our bodies. This typically is thought of as negative stuff– emotions and experiences that were too overwhelming at the time to process (like a death in a past life) or various traumas in our own life that were too emotional or too much for us to deal with at the time. This energy then gets consolidated and walled off in our bodies.

As a side note, we also carry the wisdom of our ancestors, the joy of our past lives, and the beauty of our current life with us.. it just is a vibration around us rather than being walled off.

Dr. John Upledger (innovator of CranioSacral therapy) referred to this phenomena as an energy cyst– a localized area of walled-off, entropic energy. The body walls this energy and experience off in a localized area and then disassociates from it in order to keep the whole organism (our physical-mental-emotional-spiritual) continuum and our external day-to-day lives intact and reasonably functional.

In Shamanic work there is a thought that this energy actually leaves, or goes somewhere. This really isn’t true. We are always whole, all of the time. We just believe or create stories that we are not. What happens is that we actually are holding a trauma in our intestines from that time we got made fun of as a teenager, in our uterus from a previous life dying in childbirth, or in our heart from an ancestor losing a child and having an emotion of grief be too overwhelming. This energy then, as I said, walls off, still believing that the incident is still occurring because it simply doesn’t know any better.

So we will have parts of ourselves that believe we are still a five year old whose father just left, or parts of ourselves that are still in a cycle of grief from our ancestors. Our minds, and then our physical bodies, wall this energy off so we can go about our lives without having to deal with the energy. In reality, we are whole, but our minds have fractured. And then our body-mind fractures, leading often to physical issues in the localized area of the “energy cyst”.

So in a soul retrieval the story of that energy cyst comes up to the surface to be released and integrated. The difficulty with this is that it then has to process. Meaning that if we have an energy cyst in our liver that is pretty large that contains a lot of anger and depression we are going to have to deal with that, to integrate that.

All that being said, the practitioner should know how to help the client/patient cycle that energy, have a basis in working with trauma so they can recognize when an experience from the past shouldn’t be uncovered (or fully uncovered), and provide appropriate aftercare to deal with the ramifications of such an energy.

It is somewhat rare that spiritual practitioners, who often operate outside of the licensing process, have an understanding and appreciation of emotional health and trauma response (the physiology of trauma, basically) to understand if an experience is too much to uncover, and to help their patient through when they do uncover something deeply traumatic. Trauma is real, and it has real, physiological consequences. If the practitioner is not trained in trauma response, I suggest that they pair up or learn to refer to someone experienced in trauma response. My personal favorite is Somatic Experiencing practitioners, who are typically open-minded as well as have gone through a three year training (or more) just in trauma work and know everything about how trauma shows up and how to process it. Nobody should have to process their trauma alone. It is much harder to do so, and to have the perspective when you are overwhelmed and emotional to do so, especially if it is something as removed from our current lifetime as past lives (but really, in any case).

It is also rare that spiritual practitioners do appropriate aftercare. Although a different subject, I have worked with people who have gone to the jungle and through Ayahuasca ceremonies and come back deeply traumatized because of sheer overwhelm at the amount of material coming up to process at one time. Our body-mind fractures for a reason, and it takes a sound mind to be able to process this stuff. Ideally for something like a soul retrieval, especially if they are working with an energy cyst that contains multiple lifetimes there would be a minimum of three appointments (ideally five). This means that the “shaman” would do the soul retrieval (sometimes this may take more than one session) and would schedule appointments weekly, or bi-weekly, to deal with the processing of energy and residual energy that comes up. This unfortunately does not happen too often, and the client is left with an energy cyst burst open and to deal with the residue and trauma on their own. If the spiritual practitioner does not want to deal with the residue, again I suggest a referral to a Somatic Experiencing practitioner, or an Acupuncturist, another Spiritual practitioner or Energy Worker who can help this energy clear out.

So if I were to summarize this the answer is yes we need to process things. But the answer is also no, we do not need to have months of processing or deal with the process alone. Although integration and re-orientation can take longer than this period of time, the longest that someone should have to deal with really intense energy and emotion after a Soul Retrieval or any sort of energy cyst/emotional clearing process is three days. What happens after that period of time, or if the practitioner brings something up into consciousness that the patient wasn’t ready for the client/person just becomes re-traumatized and forms another energy cyst out of the current as well as past experiences that were brought up.

This means that they should have a follow-up appointment (or at the very least a check-in) with their spiritual worker or another professional if any emotion or experience is still lingering. And the spiritual practitioner should ethically be aware of when a big process is starting to do follow-up appointments and referrals so their patient does not end up non-functional or even hospitalized (yes, unfortunately, it does happen on occasion if the spiritual practitioner is not versed in working with trauma).

Just for clarity, I will say how I do spiritual work with emotions/trauma and Soul Retrieval work. I will have someone come in or send me an email for distance work (not for Soul Retrieval, although that may be their interest… I do not do “pick and choose” appointments, I ask the energies I work with and do divination to see what type of spiritual work should be done). Based on the first appointment and how intense the experience is (or not, if the person has a sound body-mind or a milder experience or meditates a lot), I will do anything from just checking in a few days later and suggesting aftercare like salt baths and connecting to nature or having sex (yes, I suggest that sometimes) or watching a funny movie (yes, I suggest this a lot actually) to telling the client that there needs to be 1-3 more appointments in short succession (1-2 appointments a week).

If the person reports back (especially for distance work) that they are non-functional, or are really struggling after the work (which occasionally does happen, but not that often since I make it a policy to ask during the appointment the persons subconscious if they want to deal with a specific trauma and/or are ready to) I suggest a Somatic Experiencing practitioner in their local area (or a thoughtful therapist if they cannot find an SE practitioner) to ensure that they are safe. When they get out of the intense amount of struggle phase they can come back and I will help them process the rest of the energy. But it is our responsibility as spiritual workers to ensure that the people we see are safe as well as functional (especially after a few days) after we work with them. There is no reason for someone to be dealing with that much trauma and emotion over such an extended period of time. They are just being re-traumatized at that point.

I hope that helps, Katie. We can all help others as well as ourselves work with trauma, but if we are not qualified, there are a lot of people out there that specialize in it, and there is no reason to deal with it by ourselves. It is a beautiful thing to become more whole, to release emotions and experiences that likely have a huge impact on our lives, and if it is done with clarity, with understanding (of trauma and emotions on a deep level), and with appropriate care, it can have a huge positive effect on anyone willing to plumb those depths to become more realized and whole.

Spiritual Advice: What is Wrong with being a Lightworker?

Date: May 17, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: raising your consciousness, Reiki, Spiritual Advice column, Spiritual Awakening, Uncategorized

Dear Mary:

I enjoy reading your blogs. It is nice that it is not a repeat of information like so many blogs tend to be. I appreciate the time and effort that you put into teaching about things that go beyond what is commonly taught or thought about. I do have a question though. In some of your blogs you talk about lightworkers. You speak about how you take issue with lightworkers and what they are doing, but I am not 100% clear why. I am a long time Reiki master and can see how there are some issues, but can you clarify this for me?

In appreciation,

Mel

Hi Mel-

Thanks for the email! (If anyone wants to submit a question for my spiritual advice column they can by contacting me with the heading “spiritual advice” and I will answer it if it would make a good blog and/or I am able to).

I have no difficulty with bringing more light into the world, of people doing good or thinking positively. We actually need that in this world, and more of it is always wonderful. What I take issue with is the lightworker community thinking that anything “not light”– and by that I mean their individual and often very puritanical and judgmental version of what “not light” means is– is “bad”, “wrong”, “ego”, or whatever modifier they put on it and is cast aside so that they can only focus on the “light”.

Lightworkers often use the “light” as a way to judge everyone around them (even if they are talking constantly about how “nonjudgmental” they are) and use only focusing on the “light”, the safe, the positive as a way to not look at the world around them, to not look at people, cultures, economic realities, or other situations different than them, and often to not do anything but sit in judgment and victim blame people who are having difficulty in their lives.

It is easy when life is going well to judge other people for attracting negative elements in their lives. It is easy to say that there is a reason for everything, and if something negative happens to someone (diseases, murders, rapes, finances, homelessness, and even smaller things like bugs in the house or cars breaking down, for example, or for spiritual happenings anything from curses to spirits in the house to bad dreams) that they deserved it and/or attracted it to themselves. This is utter bullshit (pardon my language). There are so many different layers of existence, and the reason that a five year old is homeless, or that a woman (or man) just got raped or mugged or killed often has nothing to do with them. And if it does, it has to do with karma (as in, not the new-age definition of karma but as in they are replaying or dealing with an action in a prior lifetime that only vaguely has to do with them in their current incarnation).

As much as the “lightworker” community feigns ignorance (or is actually ignorant) there is more out there than just you creating the universe singularly. There are societal, communal, and global energies that create the world… and beyond that cosmic flows…and we all have ancestral, family, and even past life patterns informing our current existence. Most of us are not aware of any of these patterns and how they make up and/or inform our singular existence. Although it can be really comforting to think in an odd way that a starving five year old somehow “attracted” this energy to her and if you just think positively you will never be homeless, or need food, or have to deal with anything “dark” it simply isn’t true.

The other huge illusion in the “lightworker” community is one of control. All lightworkers I have met have this huge illusion of control. That if only they think correctly, or go to the right amount of yoga classes, or only “journey” to the upper and lower worlds in core shamanism, or don’t read or look at “dark” or “bad” things, that they will be in control of every aspect of their lives and their outer world and their lives will be complete enlightened bliss. This isn’t what any version of actual awakening is like (read my what it is like to be awake here) but helps lightworkers feel like they are in control of everything, including the cosmos, and if they are just positive enough they will get the new car or house they have been wanting.

The biggest difficulty I have with lightworkers, though… is not that they are judgmental, or lack compassion, or victim blame, or try to control everything in the world around them out of a huge misguided fear of control and sub-realization that they are not in fact in control (which is where all of this fear and need for control actually comes from, and why so many of these LOA and other “gurus” can so easily create memes and programs and illusions that are rather meaningless but incredibly popular), and all of the illusions… it is that they do not take care of their own issues, and with the amount of light that grows the amount of darkness grows that needs tending.

Let me explain. When you take Reiki classes, or you go to a Shamanic workshop, or start getting interested in whatever spiritual or religious path there is a good chance that you will, at least temporarily, be growing your light. In simple terms, this means that the possibility of awakening, or awakening has started… you are beginning to remember or understand your spiritual path (or at least be interested in it), and you are actively sending energy into the world and being in the world in that state.

This can be wonderful. We need more light in this world. But the more light you are aware of the more darkness comes up. It comes up to heal, to be worked with… and to be loved. Darkness isn’t “bad”. It is beautiful. It is as beautiful and special and crucial for awakening as the “light”. It is all light, in fact, the darkest black and the whitest white.

But anyone who is on a spiritual path, anyone who is on any sort of healing path, anyone who is in the awakening process has a responsibility to take care of their own shit. You cannot fault people who are asleep for reenacting their patterns again and again, for putting themselves back to sleep when they are wounded or feel out of control. But people who are awakening are having their issues rise to the surface. Their issues are more active, basically. And these issues, if not taken care of, go into the consciousness of the collective grids.

Basically, anything you do not take care of is taken up by the collective shadow, by societal, communal, and world energies. It is how war is created, it is how the Kardashians are created… And people who are “awakening” (which all lightworkers are to some degree) have a bunch of energy that is “dark” or rather uncomfortable that is coming up to deal with. And most of them do not. So it goes out into the world.

That is my difficulty with the lightworker community. That beyond the many illusions of control that are created (I still think it is odd anyone thinks they can control the cosmos let alone the spiritual realms)…that beyond the fact that I frequently work doing “fix-it” work from well-meaning but ignorant spiritual practitioners who victim-blamed people, who didn’t help people, or who screwed people up royally… that beyond the fact that they think that everything can be taken care of by sending white (or purple, whatever the trend is these days) light… that lightworkers are not taking care of their own issues that are arising, so those issues are becoming a part of the collective grids, and are just adding on more illusion, more sleep, more anger, more fear, more control issues, more shadow into a world that is already drowning in illusion and neglect of anything considered “dark” or “bad”.

It is only by loving ourselves… every inch of ourselves.. both “good” and “bad”… both “light” and “dark”.. that we can become fully awakened, that we can become fully embodied, fully healed. It is by reconciling ourselves, being at peace with our emotions (all of them), the murderous aspects of ourselves, the demons that we have inside, the fears that we have, the things we have done yet dare not say, the impulses and sexual urges and “sins” that we can do so. They do not need to be cast aside. They do not need to have illusions heaped on top of them. They do not need to be cleared. They need to be loved every bit as much as the brightest happiest joy filled wave of bliss. This is how we stop putting things into the collective. This is how we go beyond illusion. This is how we awaken.

I am now accepting new submissions for the spiritual advice column. If you have a question, feel free to contact me with the heading “spiritual advice”, and I will answer your question if it would make for a good blog and if I can actually answer it.

Spiritual Advice: Control, Law of Attraction, and the true nature of Enlightenment

Date: May 3, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: Enlightenment, Spiritual Advice column, Spiritual Awakening, Uncategorized

This letter has been edited…you can read the whole letter as a response/comment to the blog on Kundalini, Spiritual Awakening, and Control here (click on comments).

My dear Mary,

I understand that there is a pervasive attitude in the new age community which seems to be telling us that we can affect all aspects of reality by means of our will alone, at least in theory. This is interpreted to mean many things and a lot of what is touted as “law” or a consequence of this “undeniable truth” does often seem naive and misinterpreted (or just straight up wrong), and can result in a ‘blaming the victim’ sort of approach to “helping” people, (or advising them on how to help themselves); nonetheless, I must admit it: even though I accept fate, I also believe in the affecting of reality via the will!

Is it not both?

I have read a lot about the methods of becoming more successful at ‘manifestation’ (ie prayer, meditation, visualization, affirmation, ritual, spell, cultivation of subconscious belief, etc.) — and with actually many years of practice now I am of the opinion that something more than confirmation bias is responsible for what appears to be a development in my ability to affect reality. This belief, that I have a degree of power and control previously unrecognized, or undeveloped, has been a major catalyst in my spiritual development and study of philosophy and other abstract matters. I have a better life now than I once did.

But in those moments of intense existential fear, or of strongly disliking some aspect of my life and very much wanting it to change, I am deeply comforted by the illusion/knowledge of control. And the idea that it’s an illusion really scares me, as do the existential/Buddhist concepts of life having no inherent meaning. This can be extremely depressing on lonely, rainy days.

I guess the main thing I want to ask is, are you sure that those of us at the lower levels of awareness really benefit from the idea that we have no control, or mightn’t some of us be nourished by our ‘law of attraction’ paradigm? I feel that I am, but at the same time, I’m still rather fearful and as much as I hate to admit it, I do feel that as long as life is going well, it’s easy to look at other peoples misfortunes and comfort ourselves by saying ‘well, they attracted that at the subconscious level’ and I suspect that this is a head-in-the-sand thought maneuver. At the same time, in all honesty, I do believe that at some level this is utterly true, wrong (both morally & theoretically) as that may seem to some.

Also, and this is in response to a certain message you’ve gotten across in other blogs about our individual puniness, are you not in line with the concept that we are united in essence with God, and an extension, yet identical in substance, of this Force, and therefore powerful little limbs in our own right? Cheesy as it may seem to some, the LOA idea that we are “co-creating with the universe” remains one of the most profound spiritual concepts I ever embraced, and as an added bonus it seems to solve the free-will/determinism problem in a way that western philosophy never could (and I literally majored in philosophy). I guess I just want to know if, due to being at a kundalini-unleashed level of awareness, this idea also has been blown to smithereens, and/or could it still be valid at the same time?

With love and respect,

Adriana

Hi Adriana-

Thank you for your thoughts. I find it easier, and more beneficial, to respond via blog because other people have made similar inquiries. What you are coming up against are paradoxes, and in simplicity what I would say is that when people gain spiritual awareness/awakened state something can easily be true and false at the same time.

By that I mean that the LOA is true… but it is also very false at the same time. At the deepest spiritual levels we do not have any control. Things flow as they are intended to… and when we are awake we can realize that flow and capitalize on the opportunities and energies of that flow. This is one of the deepest, and most difficult lessons for anyone who is undergoing a spiritual awakening to deal with.

We love control. The idea that we do not have any on the deepest levels is terrifying. Most people come to spiritual matters, to spirituality itself because they are unhappy with their lives. They are unhappy with themselves. The spiritual precepts (that are very true by the way) that we are divine, that we are beautiful, that we are something, and that we have a specific spiritual path with specific unique attributes to bring to this world is extraordinarily appealing. Most of us have felt so horrible about ourselves and dislike our lives to the extent that these precepts are what we look for.

The same is true about oneness. We are lonely. We are isolated. We feel like nobody cares for us. Many of us feel like screaming out about what our lives have become, who we have become because in our hearts we know that things could be different “if only”. So the idea that we are all connected, that we are all part of one big flow of divinity is immensely appealing.

And these precepts are true, by the way. They just are also false. There have been illusions created on top of these precepts, intellectualization of these concepts, and these concepts are read and seen by people who are still dealing with the very real experience of feeling isolated, of having poor self-worth, of hating their lives. This intellectualization has created a lot of mythology about what these experiences, what the direct experience of these states is actually like. And a lot of falsehood.

So yes, it is very comforting for people to believe that they alone create the Universe, or are co-creating the Universe, it is very comforting for people to believe that we are all oneness like a congealed blob, and that if they were only “awake” enough, or went to go to yoga or did certain meditations or got the right spirit guide that their lives would be bliss, that all of their self-worth issues, their isolation, and their hatred would disappear.

But, quite frankly, I do not talk about that or to those people because 99 percent of the information in the spiritual community is for those people. Those concepts are comfortable, and people are welcome to them. But there is a certain percentage of the population who is ready to go beyond those ideas, and there is very little material out there for those people who are actually awakening, or actually struggling with realizing that the intellectualization of these spiritual precepts is false.

Most people are creating a lot of illusions out of these precepts. They only “think positively” because to think negatively is “bad”, they only “journey” to specific places in Shamanism because everything else is “dangerous”, they will not think about other cultures and how they are appropriating their spiritual precepts because they are entitled to them without doing any work or actually understanding (which may take decades) of what a specific spiritual path is. They think oneness means to not judge anyone ever and that we are all the same, because the person thinking this feels inferior. They think spirituality is somewhere “out there” because of hatred for the physical form and their physical realities. They think that if only they were spiritual enough they would be able have complete and total control over their lives… because in our hearts we realize that we could die tomorrow, we could be murdered, we could be in a plane crash or be raped or be homeless… and the illusion that if we only think hard enough or are spiritual enough that this stuff wouldn’t happen to us is very, very comforting.

To dispel that illusion though… for complete and total clarity… the homeless five year old child who is starving didn’t do anything wrong, the woman who lost her job with three kids to support and is being evicted didn’t do anything wrong, the woman who just got raped down the corner didn’t do anything wrong, and the man who died after being mugged didn’t do anything wrong. On the surface level, we can judge them, or say they were wearing the wrong clothes or it must be “karma” or not look at them at all, because to do so would ruin our illusions of control. That if we were in complete and total control our lives would totally be ours and we would never have to worry about death, taxes, and hierarchy of needs type issues (food, clothing, shelter, etc). Nobody wants to think about that there are bigger energies, bigger issues out there, than self-created issues. And there are.

We create our world to a certain extent. But other people are creating theirs. And they might not be willing to deal with their issues, or unable to deal with their issues. And they might break into your house and harm you. As communities we create our world, as a society, as a world. And then the cosmos creates our world. And we have some control, we have our individual will… but we do not have control over others to the extent we think we do (i.e. not everything/everyone is a mirror), and all of the new-agers who only want to think positively and judge everyone who is poor or homeless or whatever else because it will never happen to them because they are “spiritual” and “think right” is actually actively participating and creating the cultural and world shadow that creates the situations in which black teenagers get shot by police, or wars, or hate crimes… because they are not willing to look at their own shit, basically, and it enters the communal and world shadow.

To get to the heart of your question, though… The LOA is true to a certain extent. To achieve something we must have spiritual, mental, and physical alignment (basically). The simplest way to talk about this is getting a new car. If we focus our mental awareness on manifesting a new car (LOA or mantras or vision boards or simply thinking about it) and we focus on the physical aspects of it (saving money, getting another part time job, doing research on cars and finance plans, etc) and it is in the appropriate spiritual alignment (meaning that it is the divine right time for us to get a car, the energies of the Universe, so to speak are creating the opportunity for us to have one) then we will likely get the car. If one of these is really out of balance (spiritual, mental, or physical) we will not. So yes, you can think your car into existence. But you also need to have a job that can pay for all of your daily expenses and a car. And it also needs to be the right divine timing for one. If one of those is somewhat off, we will get the car, but struggle. When everything is in alignment– physical, mental, and spiritual– we generally get what we want out of this world. But when we are in that state, what we “want” changes, and the realization that profound spiritual energies flow through us and create our world and that no matter who we are we die, get diseases, and have stuff happen in our lives, also happens.

It is easy to think that if we were in control we would get whatever we would want. We would be rich, we would have the perfect body, we would feel connected to everyone, we would love everyone, we would love ourselves. Finally. We would know what we were intended to do here on Earth and our misery would cease.

Most people who are awakening get to the “highs” of spiritual happenings and stop, just going from experience to experience looking for that high like an addict. They do not progress. Most people who are somewhat awake (awake enough to be interested in the subject) go to the gurus, the spiritual precepts, and the books that will facilitate them feeling better about their lives, that make them believe that if they only took this class or did this thing or were more awake that their lives would be total bliss and they would be multi-millionaires. They do not move on from this understanding because they do not want to, and they are left in a state of perpetual wanting, always seeking the next guru or book or meme or Oprah show to show them the next thing they should do, the next surface spiritual path they should take.

For others who are actually awakening they discover that the direct understanding of these spiritual precepts is true. We are all connected, we are all one, we are all divine, we are all in bliss… we find our purpose and know why we are here, we have access to power and feel “big” and discover our self-worth and are embodied and integrated and know what is going on in the world… but we are simultaneously very small, and not that big of a deal, and that we can have stuff happen in our lives no matter how “spiritual” we are… and that looking from the vantage point of being awakened you can be simultaneously in oneness and also isolated, that you can feel bliss and full of self-worth and embodied and also feel sorrow, and pain at the same time.

I hope that provides food for thought. I wish you the best on your path. It is admirable that you are willing to be uncomfortable, that you are willing to look at things beyond the level you are currently at. This trait leads to true awakening… which is beautiful and blissful and wonderful… just not in the ways that is marketed to you.

Mary

Spiritual Advice: Seeing Energetic Lines and Grids

Date: March 19, 2015

Author: maryshutan

Categories: Enlightenment, psychic abilities, raising your consciousness, Spiritual Advice column, Spiritual Awakening

Hi there. I sometimes see energetic lines. Sometimes in my bed at night I lie awake and can see grids and lines. This has just been happening the last few years. Sometimes they just look like faint lines, sometimes they look like a tic tac toe grid, and other times they look like a big net. They are varying colors, blue, silver, or white mostly. When I describe them to people they don’t know what I am talking about or they say that they are in my head. A practitioner I went to told me that I was seeing the grids that make up the universe. Can you tell me more about this?- Empath in San Diego

Hi Empath-

Yes, what you are describing is what is known as the grid system. It is actually pretty rare that people can see these, sometimes people get a sense of them… but it suggests to me that you are actually pretty advanced and highly clairvoyant (clear seeing) if you can actually see them.

I will attempt to keep this simple. We have energies that make up ourselves. This is our personal history, our family history, past lives, and our ancestral history. These all have to do with us, our own stories, or own energies, who we vitally are as people. As an interesting side note, a lot of people are not able to see past this point and think that everything in the universe is about them, or a reflection of themselves. But there are many energies past this point.

When we get past the energies that make up us and how we came to be as individuals… meaning our individual belief systems, stories, and the energies that inform our personal spiritual path and personal energetic history, we come to communal energies. These are the grids, or nets.

Once we get beyond the idea that we make up the universe we realize that collectively we make up our communities, our society, our state, our country, our world. As individuals we feed energy into this system, and by taking personal responsibility for our part in it we can do a lot of good. But there are hundreds, thousands, and even millions of people creating these energetic grids.

These grids are the collective energies that we all blindly are under the thrall of (well, most of us are). They inform our thoughts, our activities, our cosmologies. There are many grids ranging from grids that are fairly close to us (our community grids) to grids that comprise the universe. Most people when they are waking up see the closest grids, those of the community and societal grids. There are specific colors to the grids, but I do not teach them to people because then they have an expectation and start to self-create the grids instead of actually experiencing them directly (this happens all the time with the chakra system and colors).

Once we wake up to these grids we can transcend them. We can notice how our community is under a collective thrall, how our society is largely in a sleeper state and wishes to remain in that state (this is how we get things like the Kardashians), and we can then choose to act differently. This means that when we go out to the local restaurant or movie theater and notice how collective energies are causing people to act a certain way, or that most people are really asleep (especially to this level) and are moving through their lives in a really unconscious state we can acknowledge that this is happening. When we do this we will naturally transcend this level and act differently. When we wake up to a grid we can understand it and break free from it.

Ideally this would be done grid by grid, starting with the grids closest to us and working our way out to universal grids. I will say that there are some really highly psychic individuals who unfortunately are plugged into the really large grids that have huge energies (like the world or universal grid) and are really unskilled (meaning they do not have the tools to deal with it and have no idea what is happening) which can actually have pretty devastating consequences on their life and health.

It is also worth a mention that once we transcend the world and universal grids that there are grids that make up the outer energies of the universe, like the grid of archetypes, collective consciousness, and mythic layers, as well as geometric patterns. There are also energetic lines that create the world- the earth, our land, our homes… which can be seen, felt, and worked with by some people. And beyond all this is the void, then pure consciousness, pure divinity, freedom, an awakened state, etc. Each of these grids is within our own body as well as is reflected in the universe. The more we break free from not only our own Self layers (our own history, past lives, ancestral and family wounds and belief systems) and the collective layers (the grid systems and collective energies we create as communities, states, and the world), the more freedom that we have and the closer we are to a truly awakened state.

So in summary: Yes, you are seeing the grid system. You are seeing collective energies. Acknowledge them, meditate on them, see how they affect you and those around you. If they are making you ill or you are feeling off balance because of them you simply need some skills to navigate them.I suggest looking at my books, particularly Managing Psychic Abilities, if you are interested in learning what your psychic experiences may mean, and how to work with them, or my Discernment course.

Due to the amount of emails received, Mary is unable to offer advice, guidance, or referrals via email.

Spiritual Advice: Not connecting to the Earth and Feeling Death and Dead People

Date: March 20, 2014

Author: maryshutan

Categories: Mediumship, Psychopomp, shamanism, Spiritual Advice column

Hi Mary,

I have always felt like I am not a complete person, like I wasn’t connected to myself. My soul or my spirit is not one with my body. It’s been like a part of me, and frequently I have thought my soul, is trying to pull me or is called elsewhere. Whether on this Earth or beyond that.

Also, this feeling coincides with when I get these other feelings of something or someone unseen approaching. Usually it’s a heavy, dark and mysterious feeling. I always feel that something is about to happen but I can’t figure out who or what it will be. I just know by how strong the feeling is if it will be someone close in my family. The stronger the feeling, the closer to me they are, and it is usually a death. Now, I just say that I feel death. The feeling normally doesn’t fade until the event happens.

I feel that this year I have become more sensitive to both feelings I have described to you. I can now feel it for people I have never met, but live in my area. Here is an example of a recent experience. One night, I was sitting around the living room as my mom cooked in the kitchen. While I was checking my email the air suddenly became heavy, familiar, but also unfamiliar, however it didn’t feel ominous. It felt like someone was around. I spoke out, more to myself, that someone was here and I asked to no one particular, “who are you?” I felt it more a person this time. The thought of my deceased granddad came to my mind I broke down crying. I could not stop. The feeling was so strong and overwhelming. I tried thinking if it could be something or someone else, but nothing seemed to be a better answer than it being my granddad. My thoughts came back to him and it touched my heart. It felt like an affirmation.

When I finally spoke to whomever it were, believing it to be my grandad, I smiled and told him that I was glad he was visiting but his presence was very strong. I nicely asked him to tone it down some and then the feeling began to subside. A few days after that visit my grandma was rushed to the hospital after having a heart attack. I have felt that he came to let us know something was about to happen. I tied everything together, but I’m unsure of what I may be feeling or going through. It’s a haunting feeling, but it’s beautiful also because I feel more than just the physical of this world. None of it bothers me, except that I don’t understand completely what it is and that maybe it could be just in my mind or really something more.

– Unsure

Unsure-

It sounds like you are a natural medium and psychopomp. A medium is someone that can see, feel, or sense that spirits or other beings or energies are around them. Typically, most people use the word medium to mean that you can see dead people. However, historically people who are natural mediums utilize any of the psychic senses (meaning that you can see, sense, hear, even taste while being a medium depending on your natural psychic tendencies) to communicate with the deceased. Your natural psychic tendencies means whatever psychic abilities are open- some mediums tend towards seeing spirits, others hear them, others simply feel changes in the environment. A student of mine can taste a difference in the air and smell certain spirits. Many mediums have more than one psychic ability that goes along with mediumship, or will naturally develop more abilities or stronger abilities if they work with their mediumship skills.

The other aspect of mediumship is that although it is traditionally thought of as speaking or communication with the dead (as in dead people), this is a popularized notion. Real mediums are often quite empathic, and can sense many different things in a room- from emotions to spirits to beings of all sorts. And yes, dead people. But also everything from medical information on the living to seeing portals and mountain spirits can be developed or utilized with the ability of mediumship.

Mediumship is typically generational- meaning that someone else in your family has it. They may not be willing to talk about it, but sometimes it can be comforting to know that this ability comes from somewhere. Mediumship is typically one of the strongest psychic abilities, and can be one of the most overwhelming. Natural mediumship comes with a certain sort of light, or vibration within you that allows spirits, beings, and other energies know that you have the capability to see or sense them. This will draw them to you (picture yourself as a big nightlight, basically).

With mediumship often comes psychopomp capabilities. A psychopomp is someone on this side (in human form) that can help facilitate transit of the dead. This is where all of the feelings of death come from for you- you know you are intended to work with them, to help souls pass over. Picture Ghost Whisperer, but less cheesy. Until you are able to develop boundaries and understand your experiences, you will likely be overwhelmed by mediumship and psychopomp abilities.You need to develop a certain skill set that will allow for you to learn how to take on these roles you have been given, and learn how to draw extremely firm boundaries so that you have control over how and through what means you choose to interact with what comes through to you. You need a spiritual bouncer and to connect with your spirit guide. If you have a family member who is open about being a medium or sensitive and seems stable with their abilities, you can always learn from them. Since it sounds like that may not be the case for you, I suggest looking for a physical teacher who can help you learn these tools.

As far as your other question regarding feeling not of this Earth, or pulled elsewhere, I would hazard a guess that it is because of your mediumship and psychopomp abilities. You feel pulled elsewhere because you are elsewhere. You have one foot in this world, in this reality, and one foot in another reality, or many other realities. In addition to finding a physical teacher who can help you with your psychic abilities, I would suggest connecting to the Earth and becoming as embodied as you can in this reality. Play outside, hug a tree, use your very human senses- see a good movie, a play, a concert, eat good food… connect with friends and family again. You are a physical being for a reason. Enjoy it.

– Mary

Interested in submitting to the Spiritual Advice column? Contact me here with the heading “Spiritual Advice”. Please note that I am not an allopathic physician or psychiatrist, and my advice is not intended as substitution for the advice of those professionals. I reserve the right to edit emails for clarity.